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22.5 Reflections on My 45th Birthday · The Daily Writer

• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: Hey friends, welcome to episode 98 of the Born to Create Podcast.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Kent Sanders, and this is the show where we explore the mindset, habits, and skills to help you make a bigger impact in your life and creative work.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: You can find previous episodes, my free ultimate toolkit for creative entrepreneurs, and much more at KentSanders.net.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: Well, this show is going to be a little bit different.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: This is a solo show, so there's no guest today.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: But also this episode is going to be a little different because it's going to be a little more reflective and personal.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to be talking about a lot of stuff that has to do directly with creativity or the creative life, but rather I just want to do some reflecting because today is my 45th birthday, and every year around my birthday, I set aside some time just to kind of think about what I'm learning and some things that I'm going through and things that have been on my mind.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm kind of a reflective person anyway.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: On the Enneagram, I am a five, so I'm kind of reflective and I love to think and I love to process.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a high C on the disc profile, so you know I'm very analytical.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: I love to think about things, and sometimes that's not a good trait because it's really easy to get lost in my own thoughts and sort of get lost in my own head.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: But I think that is really important around the time of our birthday, just to sit down and just to think, hey, where's my life?
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: What kinds of things am I learning?
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: What am I going through?
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: Where have I been?
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: And where's my life headed?
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: And am I going in the right direction?
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: So because this is my 45th birthday, this also kind of feels like this is a halfway point of some sorts.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: I know that most men don't actually live until they're 90 years old, but somehow 45 seems like kind of a halfway point or a good point, at least between 40 and 50, just to stop and reflect.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, my uh son has a couple of friends over as I'm recording this.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's uh almost 9 p.m.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: at night, and my son's got some friends over, and they're in the next room, so you might hear some noises.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they're teenagers and they're kind of knocking around and banging stuff around and being loud, which is what teenage boy teenage boys do.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: And it just kind of makes me think, man, I remember when he was born and the time has gone by so fast, and where does the time go?
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I think anybody with kids probably thinks, where does the time go?
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's going by faster and faster all the time.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: And that's true when I think of my own life.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: I remember being a kid back in the 1980s, you know, way back when, and thinking, man, I'm gonna be 26 years old in the year 2000.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: And to me, as a kid, that seemed really old.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: 26 seemed really old back then.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: But of course, now I'm almost 20 years older than 26 years old.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: I'm 45.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: So what I want to do is I just want to take a little bit of time in this episode to think about some things that I'm learning.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: And uh just kind of some things that I've been thinking about and things that have been on my mind.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just gonna dive in.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: These are 22 and a half things that I've been thinking about.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: So I've got 22 things and I've got a little half one I'm gonna stick on the end there.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: So let's dive in.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: Number one, age is mainly a state of mind.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: Age is mainly a state of mind.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's kind of funny because I don't feel forty five.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I don't really know what forty-five is supposed to feel like.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: I don't feel any older than I did last year.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, if anything, I feel younger and more energetic because I've been training for a half marathon lately.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think that we should get too hung up on what our age is.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: I know people in their 30s and even in their 20s, and you probably do also, who act like they're 30 or 40 years older than they are.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: They're kind of crotchety and kind of stuck on their ways.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: But on the flip side, I also know people in their 70s and eighties, and even in their 90s, who are comfortable with all the latest technology.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: They're still growing and those, they're still learning.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: Those are the people who, when they go to a conference or they're in church, they're sitting and taking notes, even though they probably know far more than the person who's speaking on stage since they're younger.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: So age is mostly a matter of mindset and of attitude.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: So if you feel old, you know, again, it's just a number.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't have anything to do with your mindset or your ability to learn and to grow.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: So age is mainly a state of mind, I believe.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number two, and by the way, these reflections are in no particular order.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: These are just kind of as I thought of them, as I was writing out this post and going through this podcast.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: So these are in no specific order.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number two, running is great therapy.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: I used to ride my bike quite a bit.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: I live in St.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Peter's, Missouri, and we have tons of trails in the area.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I love all the bike trails and all the parks and all that stuff.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: And for probably the last 15 years or so, I've been kind of a nut for riding my bike, and I would so look forward to summer because I could get it on my bike and just ride along the trails and go for miles and miles and miles.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: But this year I've really not ridden my bike very much, and I've gotten way more into running.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: Now, that happened for a variety of reasons.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: One is that my wife has been a runner for many years, and every day she goes out and she runs several miles, and she's super healthy, and you know, I'd probably need to take her example and eat way healthier like she does and all that.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: So she's been setting an awesome example for me for many years.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: But what really got me on the running kick was that my brother Don, who's almost five years older than me, a few months ago, he said, Hey, I'm going to train for a half marathon.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want to do it with me?
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Well, yeah, that sounds fun.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: Now, part of that also, there's probably an element of sibling rivalry.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's not really rivalry, but you know, I can't let my brother outdo me, of course.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: So I was like, heck yeah, I'll do that with you.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: So I've been training for a half marathon, and then my wife decided to train for it as well.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: So all three of us are in this half marathon journey together.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: We don't train or run together really, but we are all three training on our own separate programs for this half marathon.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: My experience with running has been not only is it great exercise, it's also for me really good emotional and mental therapy.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: When I go out and run, I oftentimes listen to music or podcasts.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: But in fact, uh this morning when I went out for my run, for my training run, halfway through I took on my earbuds and I just I was just thinking and praying and just sort of reflecting, you know, as I'm sweating and panting and you know, sweat pouring down all over my face as I'm running on the trail.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: But running for me is really, really good therapy.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: It helps me clear my mind and it helps me get re-centered and refocused, in addition to giving me all the benefits of physical exercise.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number three, the vast majority of my daily problems are my own fault.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: Now, let me say that again because this took me, I think, about 42 or 43 years of my life to really start understanding this.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: So let me say this again.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: The vast majority of my daily problems are my own fault.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm not talking about if you get into a car accident and somebody else is obviously at fault, or some other kind of situation where somebody did something to you and it's obviously not your fault.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just talking mainly about the daily problems, the daily frustrations of life that we all deal with.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: For example, if I'm dealing with things like financial debt, misunderstandings between people, um, too many commitments or too many plates spinning, if I'm dealing with conflict with a coworker or a family member, or if I'm unhappy with my weight or my eating habits, those are all situations that I either probably contributed to or definitely contributed to.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason why I say the vast majority of my daily problems are my own fault is because when I look at my life that way, that empowers me to then change that situation.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: Even if something else is actually somebody else's fault or is mostly somebody else's fault, that realization that I have a responsibility to fix that problem then gives me power and the motivation to do something about it.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: I think many times people, and I have been so guilty of this so many times in my life, so I'm definitely not pointing the finger at anybody, mostly pointing the finger at myself.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: But there have been so many times in our lives where something happens and we think, oh man, this happened to me and it's their fault, and I just wish they would change, and why won't they change?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: And and we sort of give all the responsibility of changing the situation to somebody else.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: And what that does is it disempowers us.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: It makes us a victim instead of someone who has the wherewithal and the responsibility and the personal power to then act upon that situation and change it for the better or make it right somehow.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: So for me, this is one of the most important reflections on this whole list that I have a responsibility to change my situation.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: Even if somebody else is actually at fault, I can still do something to make it better and to uh to create a better scenario for everybody.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: Man, I remember when I when um we were first married for several years, and I'm I'm really ashamed to admit this now, but I'm just kind of an open and honest person, and you know, I figure with me, you kind of just see what you get, or what you see is what you get, rather.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just kind of putting my my own faults and my mistakes out there for us to all to learn from.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: But in the early years of our marriage, I was really bad about this.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: Something would happen and we would have, you know, a conflict.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: My wife, Melanie, and I would have a conflict or an argument, and we would sometimes go two or three days without barely speaking to each other.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: And that was mostly my fault because I had no idea how to deal with conflict.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up in a home and I love my both of my parents dearly, but I never really learned how to how to handle conflict as a kid.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: You know, every family has their own dynamics, and probably a lot of that has to do with the fact that I'm an analytical person and I don't like loud, you know, yelling and I don't like screaming and that kind of stuff, so I still have a hard time with that, to be honest with you.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: However, that being said, um after a number of years, I did learn to resolve conflict.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: And now we resolve conflict very, very fast.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, it's extremely rare in our marriage where we have an argument or disagreement that we don't resolve before we go to bed, you know, that exact same day.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I can't I can't even remember the last time that we let an argument go more than a single day.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's been gosh, ten or fifteen years since that's happened.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: So anyway, this point, as you can tell, is really important to me.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's been a an important point of learning for my own heart and for my own attitude in life.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Just this idea of taking responsibility and feeling empowered to do something to change the situation.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, let's move on.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number four asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: And man, this is a really tough one for me.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: This is really, really hard because you know, again, I just mentioned my parents.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, one of the great things that I loved about my parents is that they raised my brother and I to be very independent.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: And they raised us to be very self-sufficient and to take care of ourselves and to just kind of be responsible.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, what I'm kind of laughing about this now.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever I went to college back in 1992, I had to be at college two weeks early because I was in a singing group and we were rehearsing for two weeks before the school year started.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: So I had to move into the dorm two weeks before everybody else did.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: So they took me up to the college, you know, there's hardly anybody there.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: They check me in and the dorm staff check me in and check the dorm staff checks me in and everything.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: They helped me move my stuff in and we kind of say our goodbyes and then they leave.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, there I was, alone, basically alone in the dorm to kind of not just defend for myself, but it's a good example of, you know, they didn't hang around and try to coddle me and make sure, are you sure you're gonna be okay?
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we had gotten everything squared away for college, and they knew that I could handle it and take care of myself.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how I have always approached life.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and I mentioned earlier that I'm an Enneagram type five, and I think that coupled with the fact that I'm just a man really means that I like to figure things up by myself.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's like that perpetual five-year-old in me that's like, I do it myself, daddy, I do it myself.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: But I have had to learn to ask for help in my life.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I have learned that there's no need to just spin your wheels trying to figure out something on your own when you have tons of people in your life around you who can help you figure things out and who can help you make faster progress.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I've really come to believe that the ones who are the smartest are the people who ask for help.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: And the dumbest people, or rather, maybe dumb isn't the right word.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: That sounds kind of derogatory, but I think the least successful people are the ones who think they know everything, and they just waste loads and loads of time trying to figure things out on their own rather than consulting books and experts and people in their lives who could really help them to be more productive and to be successful faster.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: Let's move on.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number five is this it's easy to let your personality be an excuse.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: So a couple times I mentioned my Enneagram type and my personality.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: And for the longest time in my life, my main excuse was, well, I'm an analytical type.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: I like to take my time and figuring things out.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: I'm kind of a low-key guy, and I don't want to be like this over-assertive jerk who always, you know, is wanting to force everybody else into his will, and I don't want to be that sort of guy who's a jerk.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: The problem is that I wasn't being assertive enough.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there are some benefits to being an analytical professor type person, which is totally how I'm wired up.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: But there's also some also some downsides to that kind of personality.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the downsides is that you can analyze things to death without actually taking action on something.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: And this is really my Achilles heel, I believe, is that I tend to just overthink things and overanalyze things.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm going to be totally honest with you.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm actually really embarrassed to even say this, but I have sometimes a really hard time at drive-throughs.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you can relate to this or not if you're sort of an analytical person who overthinks things.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: But if I go to Starbucks, it totally freaks me out because there's so many options and it's like there's 68,000 ways you can get your coffee.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: And even if we go to an ice cream place, sometimes I just kind of freeze up because I'm like, I don't know what to pick.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: There's all these different kinds of ice cream things, there's shakes, there's malts, there's sundays, there's cones.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know what to pick.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: I know that sounds crazy to probably 98% of the people, but there's 2% of you who are listening who can totally relate to what I'm saying.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just telling you, I'm just being up front, that that's how I am.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: I get overwhelmed really easily and I overthink everything, which is not really a good quality to have.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: So I just want to encourage you, if that describes you, don't let that be an excuse for not taking action.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: Don't overthink things, don't let your personality be a reason that that holds you back.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: Now, on the flip side, whatever your personality is, it has an Achilles heel of some kind.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we all have our hangups and things that can trip us up.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: So whatever your personality is, don't let that be an excuse for not making progress toward your goals and your dreams.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number six is I have noticed a common trade among highly successful people, and it's very simple, they actually respond to their emails.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, it happened just this past week, literally earlier this week, this happened twice.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: And this has happened many times before.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: I emailed two highly successful entrepreneurs.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to name who they are because you know, maybe they didn't well, it just feels weird to mention their names, just because this was like a personal interaction I had with them.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, these were highly successful entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs with very successful businesses online, and I emailed them both a couple questions, just very simple questions, and they both replied within a day.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: And it's been super interesting because I've noticed a pattern, and that is that most of the time, A-level players seem to understand the value of relationships and they quickly reply to emails.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: But the reverse of that is also true.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: I have I've noticed that a large number of what I would call B and C level people in terms of success, they don't reply to emails, they don't reply to messages, they'll take a long time, and they'll have some sort of, you know, many times kind of a lame reason for not replying to messages.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: So that to me says something.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_00: It says that there's a correlation between valuing relationships and replying to messages quickly and your level of success.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's not a direct connection, but I think there is a connection there.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: There's something I want to explore more.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: But the bottom line is that I have really tried to reply to messages quickly.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: I don't always do it 100% of the time, but I try to reply to messages within 24 hours.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_00: Again, don't hold me to that, but that's my goal.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_00: I really want to make that my goal because I think it is really important.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number seven.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's almost always better to say less instead of more.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_00: One of the best books that I have read in recent years is Robert Green's excellent book called The Forty-Eight Laws of Power.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the laws that he has in the book is always say less than necessary.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: And the idea behind that law is really simple.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: Robert Green says that the more that you say, the greater the chance you're going to say something that makes you look bad.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: Or it may even incriminate yourself.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: So now I do have to say that you know Robert Green's books do come with um sometimes a healthy dose of cynicism about human nature.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: I would say his newest book, which is called The Laws of Human Nature, is less so, but his earlier books do come with kind of a negative view of human nature.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I suppose a lot of that's justified, I guess.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: So just kind of know that going into his books.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: But there's a lot of truth to what he's saying as well.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: In a world that cannot stop talking, especially on social media, there's a lot of value to measuring our words and exercising restraint.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this post in this podcast is maybe a bad example of that because I'm going on and on and on, and this is like a 3,000-word blog post, which is crazy.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: However, that notwithstanding, I think there is a lot of value when it comes to sometimes just conversations and just social interactions of saying less than is necessary.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know if you've ever noticed this, but many times when you're in a social situation, the person who just yammers on and they talk and talk and talk, they are typically respected far less than the person who shows restraint.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: So that's something that I am trying to practice now.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: I've never been a big social talker anyway, so that's this is not a stretch for me.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: But if you're a person who likes to dominate conversations, just kind of keep that in mind.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: That sometimes restraint is really a good thing and just letting other people have the floor.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because the less that you say, the more then whenever you do speak, people tend to think it's wiser or it has more power if there's less of it, if all that makes sense.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number eight people are starving for encouragement.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: One of my very favorite sayings is be kind for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now that quote is usually attributed to Plato, but the source has been debated by scholars for years, so nobody really knows who said that quote.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't really matter who said it, it's a fantastic quote because it reminds us that every time we meet somebody or talk to somebody, we can be assured that that person is fighting a battle of some kind.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: It may not be a battle with swords or guns, but they are fighting some kind of battle within themselves.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: There is a struggle that they're facing, there's a disappointment and discouragement or conflict that they are working through.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody that you meet, every single person without exception, wants to feel validated, they want to feel affirmed, they want to feel loved and accepted.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_00: And what really surprises me is that sometimes when I send a handwritten note to somebody, and I make a regular practice of sending handwritten notes to people, I think that's a very important practice.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever I do that, people sometimes go wild for these things.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I think because it's kind of a rare thing in our modern day and age.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: We're so used to sending texts and emails and using social media that somebody actually taking the trouble to send a print a handwritten note in the mail is kind of a rare thing.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: I remember this has been just a few months ago.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: I was talking about this issue on Facebook, and I can't remember who it was, but this is somebody from a ministry that I had in Streeter, Illinois, back from 1996 to 2004, I think when I was at this church as a worship pastor.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody at the church mentioned a handwritten card that I had sent them while I was working at that church.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: Now that's been a long time ago.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like this is over 20 years ago, you know, at this point, uh or almost 20 years ago since I was even in that position.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: So I found it kind of interesting that they remembered that I had sent that note back in, you know, a few years into my ministry there, which just goes to show you the power of affirmation and encouragement.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: People are absolutely starving for a kind word, they're starving for your affection and your affirmation and your validation.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: So whenever we can use our words to give them that in a very sincere way, that really makes friends of people and that strengthens people, and it's just kind of a very, very easy win.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: Just giving people encouragement and affirmation.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number nine if you want something, give it away.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: Lately I've been following Anna Ray Corter, who is a six uh very successful writer, and she was instrumental in the miracle.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Morning series of books, and she has tons of her own books and just is a very sharp person, very encouraging and inspiring.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, I've heard her say a few times in her talks and her books, if you want something, give it away.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: And the first time I heard her say this, and I I think it was in a TED talk, I was really struck by how simple yet profound it was.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: So her point was that if there's something that you want in your life, just give it away and it will come back to you.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: For example, if you want encouragement, give encouragement to people.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: If you want book reviews, give those book reviews to other people on sites like Amazon or Goodreads or Barnes Noble.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: If you want friends, be a good friend.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: If you want more money, give money to other people who need it.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: And the idea is that whenever you give things the way, they will come back to you in some form or fashion.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I've really been trying to be more mindful of this principle lately.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: So every day in my journal, after I do my morning pages, now morning pages is a habit that Julia Cameron talks about in her book The Artist's Way, where you write several longhand pages each day just as kind of a brain dump so you can get that out of your head and so that you can focus on your writing or other work for the day.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: So I practice morning pages and I love it, it's super helpful.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: After I do my morning pages, I make a simple list of gratitude, just three things that I'm thankful for.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: And just a couple weeks ago, I started this other practice along with my gratitude practice, which is where I write down three things that I want, and then I ask myself how I'm going to give those things away.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: For example, the other day I wrote down in my journal, one of the things that I wrote down that I want is I want to feel hope, or I want to feel validated and encouraged and affirmed.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: And so what that did for me is it made me more mindful of how I can give that to somebody else.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: Now I don't remember what I did that day to try and do those things for somebody else, but I do remember that I thought about it a lot during the day.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: So even just being mindful of something that you want and then trying to figure out a way to give that to somebody else, I think is a really great practice.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: Now let's talk about another way to get what you want.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_00: This is reflection number 10.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: If you want something, just ask.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_00: Now it sounds so simple, but I don't do this nearly enough.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know about you.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: My guess is that you probably could stand to do this more as well if you're anything like me.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: Just the practice of asking for something.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's really surprising how often people will accommodate you if you just ask nicely.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: It kind of goes back to what we all learned as a kid, just ask nicely.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this isn't a magic bullet.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: You can't go down to the local car dealership and say and say nicely, hey, can I have one of these cars?
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you're probably going to get turned down or maybe escorted out by security.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: However, you know, in situations where people can give us something or help us out in some way, if we just ask sincerely and nicely, there is a decent chance that we will get what we ask for.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: But I do know this, if we never ask for things, there is a hundred percent chance that we will not get it.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_00: So why not take a risk and just ask?
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number 11.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: This is gonna seem like it's coming from out in the left field, and it probably is, but again, I mentioned at the beginning, this is this list is not in any sort of uh specific order.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: These are just things that I thought about.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I wanted to mention this just because this is part of my, this is part of who I am, and maybe you're interested in this and maybe you're not.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, I'm gonna throw it out there.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number 11.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: I have zero interest in political discussions.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm gonna be honest with you, I've always been a pretty passive guy when it comes to politics.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: I just don't get interested in politics.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's just not something I get excited about one way or another.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I would honestly rather spend my time on things that have a more direct impact on my life.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: Now, maybe you're different, maybe you care passionately about politics and policies and all that stuff, and if so, that's that's wonderful.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: But let me share with you why this is the case for me.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: Over the last couple of years, as the United States and probably the world at large has gotten more divided and a lot more polarized, I think that the level of intelligent social discourse has gone way down.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: People have their opinions, and it's pretty rare that anybody will change their mind as a result of a political conversation.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_00: At least that's been my experience.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: So therefore, I basically just avoid it.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_00: Now, part of the reason is also that I tend to be a very task-oriented person, and uh I tend to move away from things that I don't feel are productive for me, especially if they're conversations that are going to be confrontational or unpleasant.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_00: So all those things combined basically means that I just avoid talking about politics with almost everybody, uh, except for my wife.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: We've actually had some very interesting political discussions the last few months, um.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: Which is kind of um, to me, very intriguing because we never really talked about politics.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_00: But I found it very stimulating to talk about politics with her, and she's such a sharp person anyway, and you know, we don't agree on everything, and that's actually been a super interesting learning point.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: But pretty much with everybody else, I avoid talking about politics altogether.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, let's go to reflection number 12.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: We are more than halfway there, so thank you for sticking with me through this kind of long podcast.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number 12 the most important interpersonal skill you can develop is empathy.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this is related to the last point because again, I mentioned that the level of social discourse in America at least has gone down, I think.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: You know, people, there's a lot more vitriolic comment, a lot more hatred, and people just kind of saying what they think and offending people and all that.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's directly related to this idea of developing empathy for other people.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_00: That is such an important interpersonal and communication skill.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: There's a huge lack of empathetic listening in our culture today.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: And at least what I see is that very few people have the ability or the desire to truly listen to somebody else without judgment.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_00: One of the best books that's been written in probably the last hundred years, honestly, is The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey, and I'm sure you've heard of this book, you've probably read it.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: He says, seek first to understand and then to be understood.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that advice is more important than ever in a world that is polarized and so full of hatred and division.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: We need leaders, we need artists, we need entrepreneurs who can empathetically listen to other people who have different viewpoints than they do.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: And it's only when we can listen that we can develop a relationship with people who are different than us, and we can enter into a dialogue where everybody can learn and can grow.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what's kind of amazing is that whenever you listen empathetically, whenever you listen without judgment to someone else, you may find that they actually have some good points.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: And you may end up changing your viewpoint on something.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: I know that's happened to me many times over the years.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's important to keep an open mind and just to just to take the viewpoint that you don't have to agree with somebody to be their friend or to value their their perspective or to value what they bring to the table or value their creativity or value their business or their work or whatever it is.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: We don't have to agree with everybody to be their friend.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: I know in uh, at least in our house, there's a lot of things we disagree about.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: We disagree about the foods we like, we disagree about what music we like, and you know, some of us are night owls, some of us are morning people, and and uh that's just how it is in the world of relationships.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: So we need that empathy, we need that desire to understand people and listen and develop relationships with them without having the need to judge them and to agree on everything.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number 13, completely unrelated to the last point.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_00: Number 13, I am so glad I started a podcast.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: Now, one of the cool things about a podcast is well, is that you're listening to this right now.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: If I didn't have a podcast, you wouldn't be listening to this.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_00: So the fact that you, my friend, are listening to this is reason enough for me to have started a podcast.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: So this show is coming up on its hundredth episode pretty soon.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's pretty cool because having an interview-based podcast has given me an opportunity to personally connect with a lot of guests who provide valuable insights for my audience.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: It also gives me the chance to do some teaching and some reflection, just like I'm doing in this episode.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now, don't be fooled though, podcasting is a lot of work.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: At least for me it is.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it takes time to set up these interviews and think through hopefully intelligent questions and do all the editing and the posting and all the stuff that goes into producing a podcast.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: But I love it because as Chris Ducker, a very successful entrepreneur, as he told me uh just a few days ago via email, he said having a podcast is like owning a little slice of the Internet Pie.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought that was a great analogy.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_00: Having a podcast gives you a voice and a platform where you can teach and where you can have conversations about topics that matter to you and that matter and that matter to other people.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection 14.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: Relationships are a major key to success.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: I talk about relationships a lot on my blog and here on the podcast.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: Now, as an introvert, as an analytical person, I get my energy from spending time alone.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_00: I love having alone time, but I also love people.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: When I was younger, I was way more analytical, and I would very easily get annoyed with people, except for just a few close-knit family and friends.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: But now I think I'm a much more well-rounded person.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: I think I'm I'm friendlier, I'm a little more outgoing.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'm never going to be like, you know, Mr.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: Outgoing or Life of the Party, but I I do think I'm a warmer, more hopefully a more engaging and friendlier person than I used to be.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_00: And a big part of that has been intentionally engaging in situations where I have to relate and where people are helping me grow.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_00: And masterminds are a huge part of that for me.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_00: I have two masterminds that I'm currently a part of.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_00: One meets every week online.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_00: We've been doing that for gosh, five years, maybe six years.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's been a weekly thing.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_00: Very, very consistent.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: The other mastermind that I'm a part of is a local men's group.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_00: We meet at a local coffee shop every other Wednesday morning at 7 a.m.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: for an hour and a half.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_00: And man, I've loved that group.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: It has been so helpful and so much fun.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: And those guys have helped me to grow so much, and hopefully I've been able to add value to their lives as well.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: The cool thing is that without those masterminds and without putting myself in situations where I'm around successful people, I would not have gotten the insights and the knowledge or opportunities or connections that I've had.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's not like I'm like the world's most successful person or anything.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying that at all.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: But I am saying that those people have helped me in very tangible and concrete ways.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I've come to believe with all my heart that none of us is as smart or successful as all of us.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: We all need each other.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: So if you are an analytical person, if you like to be alone, if people drive you crazy sometimes, just realize that people are also a major key to your success.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number 15 is one of the most important skills you can develop is learning to tell stories.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_00: We human beings are wired for storytelling.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's why we love novels, comic books, movies, TV shows, and every other form of storytelling.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever you come home from a day at the office, or whenever you come home from wherever you've been, what's the first thing that you do?
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: You tell a story about what happened to you that day.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_00: It might be funny, it might be surprising or tragic or crazy or whatever emotion you want to put on it, but we're constantly telling stories to each other.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I've heard it said that we are so wired for stories that our mind tells us stories all night long in the form of dreams.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_00: I thought that was kind of an interesting insight.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: I was thrilled last fall when I had the opportunity to teach a college course on storytelling.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: The students love the course, I love the course, and it was really fun to dive deep into that subject.
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_00: So no matter what your line of work, you will benefit from becoming a better storyteller.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number 16 failures are a great opportunity to improve.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_00: So let's talk about failure here for just a second.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_00: Over the summer, and I'm just going to be totally transparent with you, over the summer I put myself in the running for two major business opportunities.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: So on each of these opportunities, I took dozens of hours for each one of these, um, putting together some proposals, some ideas, some thoughts and whatnot.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I was really, really confident.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I was overly confident later did I learn.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_00: I was very confident that each one of these things would work out, and neither one of them did.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm honestly kind of embarrassed and ashamed to admit that I have spent a good chunk of the last few months, probably the last three months, just kind of feeling sorry for myself in the face of what felt like huge failures.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: Now, it's not like I went around just like laying on the ground and moping, but there was definitely an element where many times I just sort of felt sorry for myself, and I thought, why why can't I win at this?
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_00: Why do I keep having these huge failures?
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: But, you know, the bottom line is that I was just kind of being mopey and I needed to just get my behind out of the chair and dust myself off and get right back to work.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, the the other day my wife and I were talking uh right before we went to bed, and I looked at her, and this is seriously, this is what happened.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_00: I looked at her and I said, you know what?
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I've been kind of whiny all summer, and then I just have kind of felt sorry for myself.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_00: And she she gave me that look like only she can do as if to say, yeah, you really have.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um now she never said that over the summer.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_00: She was very kind and I love her to death.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so glad that we're together.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um But she she gave me that knowing look that indicated, yes, you have been whiny and kind of feeling sorry for yourself because you had a couple of large failures this summer.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_00: But you know the cool thing about that was is that now I've gained some perspective on those things, and they taught me some really vital things that I needed to learn.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_00: Things that, you know, I needed those failures to help me grow stronger.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_00: And that's how we have to approach failure.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_00: They help us grow stronger.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_00: When something does not go our way, when we lose out on something, whenever we don't get the gig or we don't get that opportunity or whatever it is, it's okay.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_00: It just means that now we've learned something that's going to make us better and stronger.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_00: And and I've since also just come to believe that those opportunities were not right for me at that time.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I am where I need to be and I'm thankful for all that.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: But uh, let's just be honest, failures are are hard to process.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um they're not fun in the moment, but we do learn a lot from them.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number 17, everybody has value.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: You know, every person you meet, no matter who they are, has something valuable to offer.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: We just have to be willing to listen to it and to receive it.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever I was in middle school band, there was a kid named Doug, and Doug was not his real name.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody made fun of Doug because he was kind of socially awkward and he talked a little bit funny, and I confess to you that there were a couple times where I sort of joined in making fun of Doug, and I'm not proud of that.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_00: I'm actually really ashamed of it because it wasn't the right thing to do, but I felt under pressure to sort of cave in and join the crowd in making fun of this kid.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_00: And um, it wasn't the right thing to do.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_00: It was horrible of me to do that.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_00: I wish that I could go back and talk to myself as a middle schooler.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_00: And if I could do that, I would tell that arrogant little middle schooler that everybody deserves respect and that Doug was a nice kid who just needed a friend, and I should have been on his side.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I can't go back in time, but sometimes I wonder what I missed by not being a real friend to Doug.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_00: Not just in the sense of how could I have helped him, but how can my life have been made better if I would have really taken the time to befriend Doug?
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_00: How could he have blessed my life?
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_00: What could he have taught me?
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: How could I be a better person today if I would have taken the time to get to know him?
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I see this sometimes in the adult world.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just kids who do this, adults do it as well.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh sometimes we just find more passive-aggressive ways to make fun of people and to put people down and to ostracize them and make them feel bad.
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_00: Chances are that there is a Doug in your life somewhere.
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_00: I know there are Dugs in my life.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there are literally Dougs in my life, but I'm not talking about people named Doug, you see.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about just people who need a friend.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_00: They're discouraged.
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe uh they're not in the cool social circle, however that's defined in your world.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_00: There are people who are excluded and maybe ostracized, maybe they're a little different, maybe they are kind of a misfit, maybe they don't quite fit in.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_00: What can we do to reach out to those people?
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_00: What can we do to make them feel valued?
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's again, it's not just a matter of, okay, how can I reach down and help this poor, sorry person?
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_00: It's really a matter of how can I help this person so that I don't miss out on the value they could add to my life.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because if I don't reach out to that person, if I don't befriend them, if I don't help them in some way, whatever that looks like, I'm gonna miss out on the blessing.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't want to miss out on the blessing.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_00: However that blessing might be defined, it might be learning something new or you know discovering just uh the how cool of a person this person is, or discovering some new hobby or some new adventure or whatever it is.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_00: But I just wonder sometimes if we don't miss out on a lot of cool things in life because we just kind of overlook people who are easily overlooked.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I'll leave that there for you to think about.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_00: Let's move on to reflection number 18.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_00: When people are hurting others, it usually means they are in pain.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_00: I've been trying to be mindful of this principle at home and at work more.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever you encounter somebody who snaps it at the people or they're irritable, it's almost always never about you.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_00: Probably they're in pain.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_00: They're something bad happened, they don't feel well, um, they're in some kind of distress emotionally, or they're struggling with depression, or they've just had something bad happen in at work or in their family or whatever it is.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_00: Chances are really, really high that when you meet somebody who's irritable or who is snapping at others or they're hurting other people in some way, probably that person is in pain as well.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_00: You know, for a long time, um, early in my marriage, I always assumed that whenever somebody in my family was irritable, it had something to do with me.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't realize until years later that that was a really self-centered way to approach life.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_00: I always just kind of thought, oh, you must be mad at me, as if I was the center of the universe.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't realize that it almost never had anything to do with me.
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_00: I just happened to be there whenever they were in an irritable mood.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_00: So this realization has really helped me not to take people's irritable moods personally.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: It's also helped me to be aware of my own irritable moods and to really be grateful for my wife, Melanie, who has put up with a lot of my moodiness over the years.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_00: So just a lot of things to think about with that reflection.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_00: Let's move on.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection 19, we are heading into the home stretch here, my friends.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number 19, this is a very personal one.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_00: I miss my childhood home.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up in southern Missouri in a little town called Potosi in uh Washington County.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's one of the poorest counties in the whole state of Missouri.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up about five miles out of town.
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_00: We actually lived in a double wide trailer.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_00: Now, my dad was very, very handy.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, he's still very handy.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_00: And when people came to our house, they didn't realize that it was a double wide trailer because he had built this really cool front porch and a back porch, and we had all this cool stuff going on in the yard, and it was very well manicured.
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it to me it was paradise.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_00: And people would come to my house and they would just be in awe that we had this really cool place out in the country.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I loved growing up out in the country that was that was paradise to me.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_00: My grandfather lived next door to us, and I adored my grandfather.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_00: He was my my hero.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_00: He really was.
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, when I think back to the most idyllic time in my life, that was my that was where I grew up and was my childhood.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_00: Probably it's that way for a lot of people.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I recently learned that our our former home had been torn down, actually, and that my grandfather's old house is in complete disarray.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_00: There's weeds growing up all around it, it's just a total mess.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody sent me a video of it and it it's heartbreaking, it's just a total mess.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_00: It hasn't been cared for properly.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_00: And to be honest with you, as a 45-year-old man, I'm trying to figure out how to process this.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know what to do with those emotions.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's very sad to me that all this has happened, and I know that time passes and time moves on, and you know, the things that matter in life are not physical houses and you know, physical places.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_00: However, I still am kind of in the midst of figuring out what do I do with that longing?
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it just sits there, you know, like it does when you when you you kind of are wishing for something in your past, but it's not attainable.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's just kind of the end of the matter is that you just wish for something that once was but is no longer there to enjoy.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, that's something I've been thinking about a lot, particularly here on my 45th birthday.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection number 20.
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_00: The most important work any artist can do is focus on creating their assets.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_00: Now, an asset is something that you control, and an asset is something that holds the promise of future value.
• 44:20
  SPEAKER_00: So just like when you buy a home, you expect that it's going to grow in value over the years.
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_00: A creative asset can grow in value as well.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_00: So that might be something like books, music, an email list, artwork that you create, a website, or any other kind of asset that can bring you value in the future.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now I do a lot of freelance writing and freelance work, but I also invest time into creating my own assets that bring me value over the long term.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_00: For example, I'm working on my third book now.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, my book royalties are not that high by any stretch of the imagination.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_00: But I got to tell you, it's really gratifying to get those emails from Amazon or from Audible that say, hey, you've made so many sales this month.
• 45:07
  SPEAKER_00: And the amounts may not be that much, but when that little amount, when I see that those little amounts deposited into my checking account, it is really, really satisfying because I realize that I created this book once, in fact, several years ago.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_00: I created the book once, but I'm getting paid for it over and over and over again.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's a that's a pretty cool thing.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: So think about creating your assets, not just doing work for other people.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_00: I think freelancing is great and working with clients is awesome, and I've been so blessed by clients.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_00: But I don't want you to be in a situation where you're only doing work for other people.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_00: I also want you to think about creating your own assets and creating things that are going to bring you value over time.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_00: I would recommend checking out the work of a poet and a creative coach named Mark McGuinness.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_00: I love his material.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um to the website lateralaction.com.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_00: There'll be a link to that in the show notes, as well as a link to a free ebook that he has on I think it's called 21 Lessons for 21st Century Creatives.
• 46:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's a free book on Amazon.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_00: I highly recommend that you check it out.
• 46:10
  SPEAKER_00: He's the one who really turned me onto this whole idea of putting priority into creating your assets as a creative entrepreneur.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: So check that out.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: There'll be info in the show notes.
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection 21.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_00: I have stopped trying to figure out God and am learning to trust him more.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_00: Now I almost didn't put in this reflection because there's a whole lot that goes into this, and someday I will tell the whole story of just my own faith journey and as an analytical sort of introvert and how I've thought about my faith differently over the years.
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's a whole nother story for another time.
• 46:50
  SPEAKER_00: But let me just give you a very quick summary.
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_00: As an adult, I struggled for many years trying to come to grips with serious questions I had about my faith.
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_00: But I felt like I couldn't talk to anybody about my questions and my doubts because I was a pastor, and pastors are supposed to have all the answers, right?
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, my guess is that a lot of pastors and a lot of Christian leaders have doubts, they have questions, they have things that they cannot seem to reconcile in their mind about faith or about science or about whatever issues.
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_00: And the way that I have always thought about my faith, well, up until up until really recent years, but the way that I had always thought about it previously was that I approached it intellectually.
• 47:34
  SPEAKER_00: And the problem was that because I had these unresolved questions and doubts and issues in my mind, I felt like I could never 100% fully committed my heart to God until I had everything figured out and reconciled in my mind, until I had the full puzzle complete.
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, the problem is that you're never really going to have the full puzzle complete.
• 47:55
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, in fact, I think anybody who is really intellectually honest has to admit at some point that there are many things we don't understand about God.
• 48:04
  SPEAKER_00: And we'll never understand because, I mean, if my puny human brain can understand everything about God, then that means God is not very big or very powerful, or let's be honest, very interesting.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_00: So I kind of came to grips with this idea that you know what, I'm never going to figure this out.
• 48:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I realized that it's okay to have doubts and questions.
• 48:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I stopped approaching my faith from an intellectual angle, and instead I started to approach it from a relational angle.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_00: Now, some of you who are listening to this probably are thinking, well, duh, it's all about relationship.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_00: Others of you who are listening may be thinking, yeah, I can totally relate to what you're saying.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_00: I've always approached my faith from an intellectual standpoint.
• 48:47
  SPEAKER_00: Wherever you fall in that spectrum, just know that this is kind of part of my journey.
• 48:51
  SPEAKER_00: A number of years ago, I would say probably in my beginning in my late mid to late 30s or so, I kind of went through this major transition where I kind of gave up on trying to approach my faith intellectually and understand everything, and I just kind of came to a point of surrender and I just had to say, you know what, God, I'm not going to understand all this.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I've read lots of books, I've researched things, I've thought through this countless times in my own mind, turning questions around, trying to approach it from different angles, and I didn't feel like I was any further along the faith journey.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I felt like I had backtracked in some ways.
• 49:29
  SPEAKER_00: And at least for me, I'm not speaking for anybody else, for me, when I gave up on trying to figure out when I gave up on trying to figure out everything, and I began to just trust God with a childlike faith, that's when things really started to change for me.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say my faith is much, much stronger these days because I've sort of let go of the need to understand everything intellectually, and I have just embraced the relationship.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I I don't know if that speaks to you at all, but that's that's been my approach, and that has really helped me and my faith a lot.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_00: Again, as I said a few minutes ago, there's a lot more to the story.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'll save that for another time and place.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_00: Don't know when when that'll be or what that will be, but um, we've got to move on to these last couple things.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection 22.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_00: The best way to ensure that I live on past my death is to write books.
• 50:23
  SPEAKER_00: And here's a little bit of a thought experiment.
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_00: So let me ask you this question.
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_00: A hundred years from now, how will anyone be able to access your knowledge, your ideas, and your story as a human being?
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_00: Do we really expect that our computer files from today will be readable by whatever technology is available in a hundred years?
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know the answer to that.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_00: You know, maybe society will be incredibly advanced.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe maybe everything will be readable like some sort of uh wireless scanner, like I'm thinking of the scene from um the movie AI that came out, I think it was in 99 or 2000, and there's the scene that where it jumps forward like 2,000 years in the future, and you know, these alien creatures are reading each other's minds, just they're like projecting their thoughts, and maybe the future will be like that, I don't know.
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe the zombie apocalypse will happen and the world's gonna be a giant wasteland in a hundred years.
• 51:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, who knows, really?
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, in my mind, the only way to ensure that my words are going to live on for future generations is to create books, specifically print books.
• 51:33
  SPEAKER_00: Now I know this sounds probably kind of antiquated because you know audiobooks are super hot right now, and and audiobooks are awesome.
• 51:41
  SPEAKER_00: Ebooks have been around for a while, about 15 years or so, and eBooks are I think I heard the other day that they account for close to half of all book sales, at least on Amazon.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_00: So we have those things, and sometimes print books take a backseat, but are those audiobook files, are those ebook files going to be readable in a few generations?
• 52:05
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I do know this that print books, you know, if they're kept dry and kept st in storage, they will last hundreds of years.
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_00: And to me, that is the only surefire way to ensure that our thoughts and our legacy and our story as a human being can remain in a format that future generations will be able to enjoy.
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_00: Let me give you an example.
• 52:29
  SPEAKER_00: My grandmother Louise Sanders, she died in 1977, and I was three years old in 1977.
• 52:36
  SPEAKER_00: I was born in 1974.
• 52:38
  SPEAKER_00: There are only three ways that I know anything about my grandmother Louise.
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_00: The first way is that my parents and other relatives have told me about her.
• 52:47
  SPEAKER_00: They've told me stories, you know, they've said lots of things about her personality and what she was like and so forth.
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_00: So that's the first way that I know about her.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_00: The second way is that my grandfather, back in the uh the 70s, he had one of those really early real-to-reel movie cameras.
• 53:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'd only shot like 10 or 12 minutes of footage, I think, at a time, but he had one of those and he made quite a few home movies.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I have a few minutes of recordings taken with my grandfather's real-to-reel camera back from the 1970s.
• 53:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I have some footage of my grandmother.
• 53:18
  SPEAKER_00: There's no audio on it, though.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_00: So that's the first two ways.
• 53:22
  SPEAKER_00: The third way that I know anything about my grandmother is that I have a handwritten notebook of her poetry that was passed down to me a number of years ago.
• 53:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's the only copy that exists.
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's stored away here in my house in St.
• 53:35
  SPEAKER_00: Peter's, Missouri, and that'll be something I pass along to my son at some point.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_00: In a hundred years, everybody who knew my grandmother personally will be gone.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_00: I knew her personally, but I was only three when she died, so I don't have any memories of her.
• 53:52
  SPEAKER_00: I only have secondhand memories of her.
• 53:55
  SPEAKER_00: The VHS recordings that those real-to-reel tapes were transferred from are probably no longer going to be readable.
• 54:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, even today, if you have a VHS tape, you're gonna have to go dig in your basement for a VHS player, if you even have one to begin with.
• 54:10
  SPEAKER_00: However, the paper notebook that she wrote her poems in, that notebook can live on for literally hundreds of hundreds of years if it's cared for properly.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there's a lot of reasons to write a book, but for me, the number one reason to write a book is that a book, specifically a print book, can outlive you by a wide margin.
• 54:32
  SPEAKER_00: Perhaps even hundreds of years if it's properly cared for.
• 54:35
  SPEAKER_00: So in my mind, writing a book is the only surefire way to ensure that your legacy is going to live on.
• 54:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, those are 22 reflections.
• 54:45
  SPEAKER_00: Let me give you a half of a reflection.
• 54:47
  SPEAKER_00: This isn't really a reflection, just kind of a little thing I want to put in there as an encouragement to you.
• 54:51
  SPEAKER_00: This is very practical.
• 54:54
  SPEAKER_00: Reflection 22 and a half is backup your computer.
• 54:58
  SPEAKER_00: Now, even though your legacy can live in print, we still live in the digital age today in 2019.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I cannot stress how important it is to have a backup system for your computer's hard drive.
• 55:09
  SPEAKER_00: I use Dropbox for all my important files, as well as the time machine backup app on my Mac for my whole hard drive.
• 55:17
  SPEAKER_00: So that's just a little tip for you.
• 55:19
  SPEAKER_00: I've heard too many horror stories of people's hard drives crashing to not mention that.
• 55:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's happened to me before.
• 55:25
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want it to happen to you.
• 55:26
  SPEAKER_00: So, my friends, there you have it.
• 55:28
  SPEAKER_00: I know this is a long um this was a long blog post.
• 55:31
  SPEAKER_00: You're listening to the audio.
• 55:33
  SPEAKER_00: This was almost an hour long, but I hope this gives you some insight into your thinking and some encouragement to do your own reflection.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to know your thoughts on these reflections.
• 55:43
  SPEAKER_00: Which of these resonates with you the most?
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to hear what you have to say on this.
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_00: You can go to Kent Sanders.net slash forty-fifth birthday.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_00: So it's four five th dash birthday, and you'll find the post and all the links there for the different resources in this episode.
• 56:03
  SPEAKER_00: So leave a comment.
• 56:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'd really love to hear what you have to say about this.
• 56:07
  SPEAKER_00: By the way, you might also like a couple of other posts on my website.
• 56:11
  SPEAKER_00: These are birthday reflections.
• 56:13
  SPEAKER_00: On my fortieth birthday, I wrote ten life lessons on my fortieth birthday, and on my forty-second birthday, I wrote another post that's four lessons from that birthday.
• 56:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll link to both of those in this post that's on my website, which again you can find at Kent Sanders.net slash forty-fifth birthday.
• 56:31
  SPEAKER_00: 45 T dash birthday.
• 56:34
  SPEAKER_00: Make sure to check out my free Ultimate Toolkit for Creative Entrepreneurs, which is packed with twenty-four amazing resources to help you write and self-publish your book, unlock your creative genius, grow your business, and be more productive.
• 56:47
  SPEAKER_00: You can find the free toolkit at KentSanders.net slash toolkit.
• 56:53
  SPEAKER_00: And hey, before I go, one last thing.
• 56:56
  SPEAKER_00: I want to take a second to mention that this episode is brought to you by Convert Kit.
• 57:00
  SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about your email marketing for a second.
• 57:03
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to build a business as an author, a creative, or an artist, your number one resource is your email list.
• 57:09
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• 57:16
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• 57:19
  SPEAKER_00: I started off my email list with one that was free but had very limited features.
• 57:24
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• 57:29
  SPEAKER_00: Then a few years ago, I switched to Convert Kit and was thrilled to discover that not only was it easy to set up and use, it was also fun.
• 57:37
  SPEAKER_00: This is because Convert Kit is designed with creators in mind.
• 57:41
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, my favorite feature is something called visual automation, which helps you set up the steps your subscribers go through.
• 57:48
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• 57:51
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• 58:00
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• 58:10
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• 58:19
  SPEAKER_00: Alright, my friends, that's over now for this episode.
• 58:23
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, remember that you were born to create and design to make a difference.
• 58:28
  SPEAKER_00: What are you going to create today?